PHILADELPHIA – After a game in which he gave away the puck on a critical shorthanded goal against, then had it bounce over his stick on the opposition’s winning goal, J.T. Miller cut off a question about his level of frustration: “I've been on for all eight f------ goals. I'm pretty frustrated.”
Only three of those goals-against were on Sunday, when the Vancouver Canucks blew another multi-goal lead and lost 3-2 to the Philadelphia Flyers. But Miller has been on the ice for all eight goals surrendered in what is close to becoming another alarming start for his National Hockey League team.
In the Canucks’ season-opener Wednesday in Edmonton, Miller witnessed first-hand the five straight goals the Oilers poured in to win 5-3 after trailing 3-0.
Of course, the Oilers have Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, two of the best players on the planet. The Flyers do not. They don’t even have Claude Giroux and Jakub Voracek anymore.
But just like on Wednesday, the Canuck power play surrendered a shorthanded, tying goal late in the second period before the home team won it late in the third. With a slow grounder trickling towards the Canucks’ goal, Miller saw the puck bounce over his blade in front of goalie Thatcher Demko, who was easily beaten by Travis Konecny when the Flyer surprised him by skating out from behind the net.
Through two games, the Canucks have led 3-0 and 2-0 on the road and collected zero points while their power play, which is supposed to be their greatest weapon, has been outscored 2-1 by opposition penalty killers.
“Yeah, man, it sucks but I don't really have the right to talk about the team at the moment,” Miller, just back from a 99-point season and soon to start a seven-year, $56-million contract extension, told reporters on Saturday.
“I take this upon myself to be a better player. I'm not playing to my standards, so I'm not going to comment on behalf of the team. The team's battling. It's not going great for us finishing the games, but it's not like we had a good start today by any means. We just happened to be up two.”
Later, Miller said: “I'm not trying to make this about me, but I'm not going to sit here talking about how bad we played when I can't even lead by example right now. I feel like I'm a little irrelevant, and being on the ice for every goal (against). . . I don’t know what to say.”
When relayed a brief summary of Miller’s self-assessment, coach Bruce Boudreau said: “Well, I mean, I think he's making a good assessment. But I know he's a great player, I know he's going to get better. He’s just having a little bit of a rough time right now.”
Most of the Canucks’ top players are.
Elias Pettersson has been excellent at even strength, although it was his forced pass that led to the shorthanded, tying goal in Edmonton. Captain Bo Horvat has been a shadow of himself. Brock Boeser, who posted an expected-goals-for of 6.2 per cent against the Flyers, is trying to get going after missing the entire pre-season with a hand injury. Demko has allowed seven goals on 55 shots so far, but is the least culpable of this group.
“Well, it is a straight bottom line that when your best players aren't your best players, then you're going to be in trouble any night,” Boudreau said. “And I don't think they've been our best players yet.”
It’s important to remember the Canucks are just two games into an 82-game season and there are still 160 points available to them. But it would also be foolish to disregard the past, the context: that after a hope-restoring 32-15-10 finish under Boudreau last season, the Canucks have squandered an aggregate 5-0 lead over two games and look in danger of repeating the awful starts of the last two seasons – starts from which the team and people in charge were unable to recover.
And now their five-game road trip gets tougher with three games in four nights, including back-to-back games in Washington and Columbus, starting Monday.
“At the end of the day, I mean, it doesn't matter about some of the goals you give up,” veteran defenceman Luke Schenn said. “At the end of the day, we were tied in both games in the third period on the road. If someone were to say going into the game, ‘Hey, you're going to be tied in the third period on the road,’ you would take that a lot of the time. Our third periods haven't been good enough. There were some shifts where we had some looks there in the third period, but between the ears, you've got to be sharp.
“I think the compete level needs to get a lot higher. At times, we're losing races to pucks, we're getting outmuscled. In my mind. . . we need to play a harder game, a much harder game. And that means taking care of the front of our net. It means being a little heavier in front of their net. It means special teams, it means forechecking, it means all areas of the game. We've got to improve and correct it in a hurry.”
On the power play and with Demko on the bench, the Canucks played the final 1:58 skating six against four. Miller and Horvat were stopped from the slot by Flyers goalie Carter Hart, and Pettersson missed the net twice on rocket one-timers.
“It's tough, but the onus is on us in the dressing room,” grinder Curtis Lazar said. “I think right now we're trying to out-skill teams, instead of outworking teams. You look at the game tonight, we just got outworked all over. We've got to find our identity. Once you play true to that and be hard to play against, then these (games) won't happen. It's about time to get going here. We've been kind of dipping our toe in the water throughout the pre-season and now into the regular season, and it's not good enough. We've just got to be better.
“Everyone means well. But words are one thing, actions are another.”
• Canucks defenceman Tucker Poolman did not play after the first period and there is obvious concern he may be suffering the return of neurological complications from migraines that forced him to miss all but one period of the final three months of last season. Key prospect Jack Rathbone is on the trip as the seventh defenceman and could make his season debut in Washington. Second-pairing defencemen Tyler Myers and Travis Dermott haven’t played since suffering pre-season injuries.
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